


Your Protector

by iamdemosthenes



Series: Powers AU [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alien Planet, Alternate Universe - Powers, Gen, Songfic, keith and pidge get dangerous, kind of?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-19
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2019-03-21 08:21:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,665
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13736934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iamdemosthenes/pseuds/iamdemosthenes
Summary: “Keith,” she whispered.Keith glanced at her, “Yeah?” He’d seen an agreeable path, and was now moving towards it, placing his feet carefully among the icy rocks.“It’s your turn to sing now.”Keith frowned and hopped over a rock. “I don’t sing,” he said sternly.Pidge shook her head slightly, “Don’t care. ‘Ts your turn,” she said groggily.Keith huffed indignantly, “If I do, you have to promise to stay awake.”Pidge blinked, then nodded slowly.“I want a verbal answer, Pidge.”“I promise,” her arms shifted in her blanket cocoon, likely crossed with whatever annoyance she could summon up despite her condition.





	Your Protector

**Author's Note:**

> An AU in which the Paladins all have powers related to those of their lions, and their armor is a bit different to account for that. Think something like a mix between the Paladin armor and BOM armor. If you want to be super immersed in the story, listen to Hoth - South Ridge (Star Wars Background Ambience) by The Music Forge on Youtube. It's pretty much the only thing I listened to while writing; it makes the environment more vivid in the mind's eye.

Keith pulled his cowl up over his nose for what seemed like the fiftieth time that varga. Dainty snowflakes lined his lashes and forced him to blink to clear his vision. Of course, the only thing he could see was the fog formed by his breath and the vast expanse of white before him, so it wasn't much help anyway. He turned to Pidge, whose sleek green armor provided the blank snowscape with the only color on the cold planet besides the vibrant red of his own.

Pidge, face currently blocked from view by her own cowl and the Altean binoculars she held to her eyes, stood beside him on an outcrop of icy rock. They were on the frigid planet of Sogreron for reconnaissance.

They hadn’t seen anything yet.

It’d been three weeks.

Pidge pulled the binoculars away from her face and pulled her goggles down to replace them, returning the binoculars to a pouch at her hip. She crossed her arms with an irritated huff.

“See anything?” Keith prompted. He knew the answer, but she needed to talk. He could indulge her that much, at least.

“Nothing. As usual.”

Keith stayed silent, and wiped the snowflakes from his face before pulling his own goggles over his eyes. They fogged over immediately and he rubbed the moisture off with his thumb while Pidge stewed.

“I don’t think the Galra were ever here. I don't think there was ever anything here to begin with!” Pidge threw her hands up, exasperated, and paused before picking up her tangent again, arms crossed to stay warm. “I think that Unilu dealer sold us faulty intel. I’d be surprised that the Galra haven't shown up and captured us yet, if it weren't for the fact that we’re in the middle of nowhere and there’s no one around for parsecs!”

Keith pulled his cowl up over his nose again.

“I doubt any of the planets in this system are inhabited!” Pidge grumbled, staring defiantly at the planet’s distant, pale blue sun, smaller in the Sogrerian sky than the moon back on Earth. 

Pidge kicked at the snow that had built up over her feet. “Where’s Red?”

Keith pulled up a holomap on his gauntlet’s projector. A red dot marked their starting point that day, a good ten miles distant from the red and green V-shaped icons which marked their current location. They’d been covering the distance on foot each day, and as the sun set on the snowy flatlands, Red would fly to meet them for the night so they could rest safely.

Keith watched Pidge scrutinize his map fruitlessly with a solemn patience. His teammates, he had learned, hosted a spectrum of character; something that was emphasized by the abilities bestowed to them by their Lions. Pidge’s vivacity and determination, for example, had manifested in the ability to grow and manipulate plants. His own stubborn, fiery tendencies had awarded him with a never-ceasing heat. Now was one of those times when it came in handy, but he was still appreciative of their hats and gloves.

Pidge soon gave up on the holomap and marched off in the opposite direction of the Red Lion. Keith took this as an allowance to close out of the holomap, and followed after her.

 

***

 

When Pidge disappeared and a hole in the snow replaced her, Keith almost panicked.

They’d been walking towards their next point of reference (A small, rocky summit that offered a slightly better view. But only slightly.) for a good two or three vargas when the wind picked up, and rather than blowing snow from one place to the next, it buffeted them from all sides. Consulting the weather radars in their gauntlets confirmed what they had been dreading on the blustery surface of Sogreron: a large snowstorm had built up a few miles to the west, and gale force winds were sure to follow. Red wouldn’t be able to land in such conditions, so they stopped to measure the distance to the summit versus trying to outrun the storm to a safer place for a landing.

The snowstorm, however, had other ideas. The wind speed picked up again and nearly bowled Pidge over, at which point she latched on to Keith’s arm (which was nicely warm) while he plotted a route to the summit. Thus prepared, they set off in single file, grimacing into the wind that bit through their cowls and stung their cheeks.

Such was their situation when Pidge suddenly fell through the snow, bringing Keith to his current position of leaning precariously over the edge of the hole, heart racing fearfully as he called out to his fellow Paladin.

She was gone in less time than it took to blink, and with little more than a surprised yelp. Keith sprang into action immediately, rushing to the newly-formed hole in the snow with caution and near-diving over the edge to reach for Pidge in time to catch a glimpse of her before the darkness swallowed her.

A moment later a blue flash appeared, followed by the electric green glow of Pidge’s bayard, and Keith leaned further into the hole. The arrow-shaped tip of Pidge’s bayard shot up out of the inky well and Keith grabbed for it before it had the chance to fall back in. Snatching it from the air by the cord, he pulled himself to his feet and dug his heels into the ground, reeling in the green line with powerful swings of his arms. He felt Pidge’s weight on the line intermittently, little bursts from her jetpack helping to propel her from the dark depths until Keith pulled her up and out of the hole.

Almost immediately Pidge dropped to her knees and crawled away from the hole, gasping for breath. Thick green vines fell from around her wrist as she retracted her bayard, where they had been tightly wrapped to secure her grip. Keith knelt beside Pidge and placed a hand on her shoulder to steady her as she calmed down. When she’d caught her breath and rose to her feet, Keith asked if she was okay. 

“Yeah—yeah, I think I’m fine,” Pidge paused and took a deep breath to calm her nerves. “But, I banged into the wall a few times, I’m concerned my armor might’ve been damaged.”

Keith nodded, “Okay, let’s take a look.”

Pidge slipped her backpack off and inspected her front side and limbs, leaving Keith to check the back and sides of her cuirass, where she couldn’t see. When she was done, Pidge reported the results of her search.

“I didn’t find anything too concerning. You?”

Keith frowned, “You’ve got an inch-wide split halfway down the side of your cuirass, but other than that, nothing.”

“Oh,” Pidge felt her side for the crack, grimacing as she easily fit a finger into the opening, “That’s nice.”

Keith snorted at her tone, “Well, there’s nothing we can do till we get back to Red. Will you be good?”

“I think,” Pidge sniffed absently, staring back down into the hole. “Depends on how long this stupid storm lasts.”

Keith tugged his hat down, giving a noncommittal grunt in response. He thought about the strange wall Pidge had bumped into as she fell.

Pidge pulled up the holomap on her gauntlet and was surprised to find that they’d reached their destination (Not that either of them could tell with how gradual the slope had been). 

“Hey Pidge,” Keith said, looking at the holomap.

“Yeah?”

“You don’t suppose we might’ve just found something?”

Pidge walked over to the hole and kicked some snow into it, careful to remain a good foot or so away from the edge.

“Maybe,” she hummed, kneeling by the hole and moving snow away with her hands. She started clearing the area directly around the hole, and Keith soon joined in her search, digging through the snow. After a while he began to doubt his earlier supposition, that is, until Pidge suddenly sucked in her breath and began pushing snow furiously into the hole.

“What is it?” Keith asked.

Pidge pushed another heap of snow into the hole and tapped her gauntlet on the ground. It rang out with a hollow, metallic sound, and Pidge looked up with a grin.

“Hear that?” she asked excitedly.

Keith nodded.

“It’s a vault door. Or something like it. I think there’s a handle over here,” Pidge turned and began eagerly pawing at another pile of snow, quickly proving her guess correct. 

A wheel stuck out from the curved disk that sat just to the side of the hole, and Pidge sat back, searching her pockets for a flashlight. Keith did the same, and they turned the beams on the walls of the hole. Now that they could see, they discovered ladder rungs lining the walls of a tunnel carved directly into the rock.

“What do you think is down there?” Pidge whispered.

“‘Dunno,” Keith muttered, pressing a hand to the topmost rung to see if it was secure. “Looks like it’s been here a while.”

“There’s a part of me that wants it to be Galra,” Pidge mused, “so we wouldn’t have come all this way for nothing. But I don’t want to just walk in. We might as well just turn ourselves in, in that case.”

Keith shrugged. “There’s only one way to find out.” He clipped his flashlight to his cowl and turned, stepping carefully onto the ladder. He tested his weight with a foot just to be sure, and then started down into the hole.

Pidge made a face and sighed, sent a message to Red to stay put for the night as she put away her own flashlight, and stepped onto the ladder as well.

After falling down the hole so quickly, the descent now felt ten times as long, and soon Pidge’s arms began to ache. She thanked the team’s training sessions for what improvements she’d made in her strength over the past year, but knew Keith was holding up much better a few feet below. Unfortunately such gratitude didn’t shorten the length of their climb any. Pidge grumbled to herself and worried the hem of her cowl impatiently, now that it had slipped past her nose and her hands were too occupied to correct it. The chill, however, seemed lesser this deep into the hole, and Pidge’s mind wandered back to her concerns about the Galra.

Could the warmth just be from the insulation of the earth around them, or was it artificial? Surely such a cold planet, so far from its mother star, would lack a proper core temperature sufficient to heat its crust. Coran had said Sogreron’s solar system of Zatix 6 was old. Even he had doubted any presence of life in such a remote sector of the galaxy.

But now, climbing down what was decidedly an unnatural structure, Pidge reconsidered. If the Galra were there, would they hear the Paladins first? Or would she and Keith have the element of surprise? She pondered these questions for a while until she felt a tap on her foot, and looked down at Keith, who laid a finger to his lips in a gesture of silence (As if they weren’t already quiet enough). The Red Paladin stepped off the last rung of the ladder gingerly and waited until Pidge had done the same before he pulled his flashlight from his cowl and held it partially covered in his hand to muffle the light. They stepped around the now-melting snow they had earlier pushed inside the hole so as not to make tracks, and began down a narrow hall, the only other passage from their position beside returning from whence they came.

By the time Pidge was beginning to wonder if the hall would ever end, Keith suddenly shut his flashlight off. Pidge, whose eyes were useless in the dark as compared to her half-Galran companion, glared at where she thought he was and groped in the dark to take hold of his wrist and pull him down to eye level.

“Why did you do that?!” she hissed.

“Shh, look,” Keith answered cryptically, then turned her head to direct her gaze down the hall. Pidge stared and waited for her eyes to adjust to what she thought would be the pitch-black corridor. Then, with a slight gasp, she saw the faintest purple glow at the very far end of the hall.

“Oh,” was all she managed to whisper.

Keith nodded with his lips pressed in a thin line (she could now see his face, but only just) and turned to continue down the passage. Pidge was now thankful for the light, despite its probable Galran origin, as watching the glow helped alleviate the seeming longevity of the corridor. That didn’t prevent her from whispering her impatient sentiments once they'd finally stepped out of the hall.

“It’s been a billion years, but we made it,” Pidge groaned, leaning against the wall. She and Keith now stood a in a small room with a soft purple light running around the edge of the ceiling, a number of doors lining the walls. Keith moved around the room and inspected the inscription by each door; they’d all picked up bits and pieces, some more useful than others, of Altean and Galran languages over their year in space. 

“Can you make out anything?” Pidge asked.

“It’s definitely Galran,” Keith answered.

Pidge nodded, “So we weren’t totally scammed.”

Keith pointed to the door on his left, “That’s the generator room, but this, I  _ think _ ,” Keith paused, “I think it’s the base’s command center.”

“Hold on, what?” Pidge asked, striding across the room.

“The command center,” Keith repeated.

“Yeah, I heard that. I’m just surprised. You sure it’s not communications?”

Keith shook his head.

“Let’s open the door,” Pidge stepped out of the way and pointed to the access panel, allowing Keith to press his hand to its surface. The Galra symbol glowed under his hand and the door slid aside to let them pass. 

Keith, summoning his bayard, poked his head in cautiously before motioning for Pidge to follow. They stepped into a short hallway that lead to another door which unlocked the same as the first. A large, round room opened up in front of them, its walls lined with dark screens and vacant desks.The far end of the room hosted a larger screen with an equally large console below it; neither one showed signs of recent use. A single, dim, purple light in the ceiling gave them just enough light to see by.

Pidge was quick to make her way to the console, already fishing her laptop out from her backpack, leaving Keith to follow at a slower pace. He perused the rows of desks with little interest, searching for any papers or symbols that might clue them into the purpose of the abandoned base. All he found was a half-inch layer of dust, and he returned to Pidge’s side to check on her progress. 

Laptop resting on the console’s surface, Pidge stood typing furiously in her focus, the cords connecting her computer to the console trailing to the floor in a haphazard tangle of wires. Pidge was never one for organization. Keith, after attempting an inquiry and being promptly silenced by the Green Paladin, stood patiently watching her fingers fly across the keyboard. 

Then something buzzed. Pidge’s attention snapped up to the screen, drawing Keith’s eyes towards it as well. The console buzzed a second time and then, a moment later, the screen flared to life. The red-hued desktop appeared on the screen and Pidge clapped her hands in triumph.

“I was able to remotely access the generator and power up this room,” Pidge grinned, not without a hint of smugness. “The lights should brighten in a bit too, I set it so that it’ll be a bit gradual though, since it’s so dark in here.”

Keith nodded and stepped closer to the console. “Let’s find out why this base is here,” he suggested.

“I like that idea,” Pidge said, searching the system’s files for anything that could give them a clue.

“Oh, this is interesting,” she added, after a few minutes.

“What is it?”

“We’re in an underground weapons testing facility. High-power artillery class too.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, check this out,” Pidge highlighted a section of text and summarized it. “Says here that there’s a battleship mount… it runs off of quintessence, and, oh, wow. It’s capable of absolutely obliterating an entire imperial fleet in one shot.”

“That would explain the debris field we flew through to get here.”

“Definitely. I thought that was odd, but I never suspected this.”

Keith frowned, “Can you find out where this weapon is?”

Pidge pursed her lips and searched the screen closely, her computer scanning files for coordinates as she pulled in any that seemed relevant. The console buzzed again and Pidge dropped her gaze to her laptop, peering carefully at the information on its screen.

“Huh, it’s on Sogreron.”

“Where?” Keith eyed the text on the screen.

Pidge pulled up the holomap on her gauntlet and plugged in the coordinates. “Should be right about here,” she pointed to a little X on the map, irregular topographical rings radiating out from the spot.

“So there is some decent elevation around here,” Keith mused. The X was situated atop what was likely a spire of rock, and appeared to be steeper than much of what they’d already traversed.

Pidge nodded and turned her gaze back to the information regarding the weapon’s location, noting with some interest what looked like a description of a forest surrounding it. Odd, she thought, that the only sign of life on Sogreron would be trees. Beside her, Keith yawned and pulled up a clock from his gauntlet, eyes widening slightly as he read the time.

“Hey Pidge, it’s getting late,” he commented.

Pidge groaned, “I’m not done though.”

“Have your computer download everything while you sleep.”

Pouting somewhat, Pidge shut her laptop and shrugged off her backpack, digging through it to procure a blanket. They both had one, and were silently thankful for the cushioned desk chairs around the room. It wasn’t much compared to the compact Altean bunks inside their Lions, but it was leagues better than sleeping on the floor.

 

***

 

Pidge bolted awake at the obnoxious beeping noise that assaulted her waking ears. Glancing around in alarm, she saw Keith standing perplexedly by the console, eyes trained on her now-open laptop. Scrambling out of her chair to join him, she scooped up her laptop and scanned the message on screen.

“What happened?” she asked irritably.

Keith shrugged in confusion. “I woke up to the beeping and thought to check your laptop.”

“Okay,” Pidge gnawed on her lip and clicked through a number of windows that she’d left open the night before. Eyes flicking across the lines of text, she let out a soft cry of triumph, and the beeping stopped.

“Thank you,” Keith sighed.

“No problem. I forgot that I still had an alarm set for if the laptop was left on. Normally I’m in Green’s hangar so the volume isn’t an issue.”

“The battery isn’t drained, is it?”

“Nope!” Pidge pointed at the cords on the floor, “It’s being powered from the generator, so it’ll be fully charged still.” Pidge started unplugging the cords and stuffing them in her bag. She left one attached, however, to port any maps or information about the mysterious weapon into her armor. Keith went to fold up their blankets, retrieving their provisions as he put the blankets away. While most of their food was in Red’s storage bins, they’d taken enough with them each day for lunch and some emergency rations just in case. Keith was glad they’d planned for such a contingency. 

Pidge finished packing up her computer and snagged one of the bags of cereal-like food Keith had set out on the console. It was dry and decidedly bland, but Allura had said it kept well, so Pidge had stuffed as much as she could into their backup provisions and called it good. Food goo was still at least five times as palatable.

With the matter of sustenance taken care of, the two of them tugged on their hats and boots (the Galran base provided a welcome opportunity to let their feet breathe), and shut the generator off before heading back to the dark passageway. The way out seemed to take less time than it had the night before, but seeing as they were now rested and hoping for the storm to have passed overnight, the walk passed much quicker. 

Upon their return to the snow-covered surface of Sogreron, they were pleased to find that the snowstorm had, indeed, passed over their current location. When Keith attempted to contact Red, however, he couldn’t get a signal through.

“That’s odd,” he muttered.

“What is?” Pidge asked.

“I can’t signal Red.”

Pidge frowned, “Maybe there’s still some interference?” She pulled up the weather radar from her gauntlet, and shook her head. The storm sat between them and the Red Lion, separating them like a thick white curtain. 

Pidge groaned in frustration. “We’re never going to leave at this rate.”

“We could go check out the weapon while we wait for the storm to pass,” Keith offered.

Reluctantly, Pidge agreed. It was better than being cooped up in an abandoned enemy base, at least. She pulled up the weapon’s coordinates on her gauntlet, and Keith plugged them into his own, plotting a course to the as-yet unseen spire formation. So far all they’d run into were flatlands and the occasional cliff separating one plateau from the next. None of which had been an easy climb. They hoped the impending ascent would be milder.

Pidge, noticing their route crossed through the forest, turned to Keith and asked “Do you think we’ll see any wildlife?”

“What?”

“In the forest. I should think it would be odd for there to be trees and nothing else.”

“Says you, who doubted the existence of any such life only yesterday?”

“Ha ha, very funny. But my question still stands.”

Keith took his time with his answer. “I think it’s possible, but I doubt we’ll see it.”

Pidge hummed for a moment, and then let the wind fill the silence for a while. Living for weeks in such a dry, cold environment chapped her lips, making it increasingly uncomfortable.

She didn’t care so much about chapped lips though, when she slipped and fell into a low spot, cursing the whole way down. Trying to stand proved equally curse-worthy, as the moment she thought she had her feet underneath her, she’d slip again and have to restart. 

While she was attending to her misfortune, Keith inched his way down the slope. He was afraid that she’d managed to run into an ice field, and if he got out on the ice with her he’d risk melting it. So instead, once he reached the edge of where the ice seemed to be, he told Pidge to use her bayard and he could pull her off the ice. She did, and soon they were both safely on the edge of the ice and climbing back to the top of the slope.

At the top, Pidge cursed once more for good measure and pulled up the holomap on her gauntlet, “Whatever that was, we are avoiding it, and any others that happen to be on the way.”

Keith looked to the map and saw the double ringed shape near their red and green V’s, a shape that was most likely the ice field. A handful of others were sprinkled across the map, but it looked like they’d be able to avoid most of them fairly easily. With this in mind, he redrew that portion of their route, and once Pidge approved of the changes, they set off again towards the distant spire of rock.

That is, until they came across the giant ice field. It showed up so big on the map they didn’t even think that was what it was, until they saw it. Five feet away. Zillions more wide. The forest on the other side.

No way were they going around it.

Pidge tugged on her hat and groaned in feigned agony.

Keith sighed and worked his way down the slope and motioned for Pidge to follow once he’d reached the edge of the ice. She sat down at the top and pushed herself slowly towards the bottom, careful not to lose control. Keith pulled her to her feet when she stopped, and they stared at the ice field to consider their options. Pidge would much rather not cross the ice at all, but that wasn’t an option at this point. Keith, for his part, was concerned, to say the least. They had no way of knowing how thick the ice was, and whether or not it would melt under Keith’s feet without first trying to cross it. Without ice skates, crossing such a large span of ice would be challenging.

Pidge huffed irritably and took a cautious step onto the ice, and then another, placing her feet carefully on its surface. She’d ice skated before, she knew how ice worked. A few more steps out, and she turned slowly to look back at Keith, who remained on the edge, watching her.

“Are you coming, or what?” she prodded.

Keith looked down at his feet, and then up at her again. It occurred to Pidge that Keith may not have ever been on ice before, having lived in the desert for so long back on Earth. Her expression softened and she pointed at her feet.

“Keep your feet flat and bend over a little, it’ll help you keep your balance,” she called, stamping her feet slowly to mimic the motion.

Keith looked at his feet again and stepped onto the ice slowly, his brows knit in concentration as he followed Pidge’s instructions and joined her on the ice. He got used to the motion quickly though, and followed after Pidge for fear of compromising the integrity of the ice. They stayed a good ten yards apart, wary of any cracks, and continued across the ice as such for a little over a varga.

And then the ice groaned.

Keith froze, “Did you hear that?”

Pidge stopped and looked at him, “Hear what?”

Keith put a finger to his lips, and they listened. A low, shifting groan rumbled through the ice. The two Paladins stared at the slick, white surface, afraid to move. Silent. Then came the pinging sound. It was an eerie, hollow sound, reminiscent of a beeping radar or the snapping of high tension wires in strong winds. It sounded wholly alien, unlike anything one might expect to hear from ice.

They only dared to move once they thought the sounds had stopped, but even then they moved slower than before. The edge of the ice was visible maybe 20 feet away, and the dark trees, branches laden with snow, loomed beyond. 10 steps more, though, and the ice groaned again.

This time, when Pidge deemed it safe to continue, Keith held back a little, hoping to decrease the chance of falling through.

Not that it helped any.

Pidge yelped in surprise when the ice cracked under her feet, a two-inch wide gap running past her for about a yard. They both froze, Pidge waiting for the echoey pinging to stop before moving again. A glance at Keith told her he was tense, ready to act should anything happen. So she stepped, gingerly, away from the crack. 

They waited: no sounds. Pidge took another step and Keith inched forward ever so slightly. Turning towards the forest, Pidge could see the edge of the ice was little more than 10 feet away now. She stepped again, and let out a breath. 

The ice shuddered. Pidge’s eyes widened in fear as she scanned the ice under her feet, another groan issuing forth from its depths. Suddenly the ice heaved and surged under the surface as it opened up, plunging her feet into the dark, frigid water. 

Her immediate reaction was shock, but as her mind raced, she felt the familiar tingle of power in her limbs and flung her hand out of the water and shot wild, twisted vines towards Keith. He caught them as he was running toward the hole, careful not to get too close, and yanked on the vine, pulling Pidge out of the freezing lake. She scrambled several feet away from the hole and knelt down, dripping icy water. She wasn’t there long, however, when Keith shuffled over and scooped her up, hurrying to reach the edge of the ice. Once there, he climbed the snow banks to the top of the slope and set the Green Paladin down by the base of a tree.

Standing under the branches, Keith now saw the dark, almost black color of the pine-like trees. Their drooping limbs, heavy with snow, sported long, thick needles, the shortest of which was the length of his forearm. The trees themselves were massive, made larger by the small size of the Green Paladin, now curled tightly against the dark trunk of the tree. Her hands scrubbed at her hair in an attempt to dry it; her sodden hat lay at her feet as she grumbled about the cold water.

Keith sat down next to Pidge and picked up her hat, wringing the water out of it before determining that it would now be useless. He tossed it at a nearby tree, and it hit the bark with a wet slap. It peeled off and fell into the snow unceremoniously.

Pidge frowned at him, “Why’d you do that?”

“It won’t keep you warm now. Besides, you can ask Lance to make a new one when we get back.”

“If we get back,” Pidge added morosely.

Keith rolled his eyes, hand moving to his bag, “Do you want a blanket?”

Pidge nodded and rose to her feet as Keith dug through his bag for the desired object. He handed it to her and she wrapped it around her shoulders like a cloak, tucking her hands under her arms. She shivered a bit to build heat while Keith tried—and failed—to contact Red. He checked the weather radar, and to his dismay, saw that the storm now covered Red’s location.

“We’ll have to keep moving, Red’s in the storm now,” Keith reported.

Pidge grimaced, “Lovely.”

“Do you think you can keep walking?”

Pidge stamped her feet in the snow a little, “I think so.”

“If you feel any colder, let me know,” Keith said, his tone more serious. Pidge nodded, and they picked their course up again, thankful that the trees shielded them somewhat from the planet’s harsh winds. Keith stayed close to Pidge, hoping that his radiant warmth would help her to dry somewhat.

When Keith heard Pidge’s teeth chattering, he’d forced her to take the second blanket, this time tying it around her torso like an impromptu dress to accompany her cloak. As ineffective as it was, it was better than nothing. And on they went for another varga or so.

That was about the time Pidge stumbled and tripped, planting her hands in the snow as she fell. Keith helped her to her feet and saw her complexion had taken on a bit of pallor, and he grew concerned. Wrapping an arm around Pidge’s shoulder, Keith drew the Green Paladin into his side, raising his temperature slightly to help warm her.

“You feeling okay?” he asked.

Pidge nodded and shuddered, but kept walking.

A varga later she slumped into his side, mumbling about being tired. Keith looked down in alarm and tightened his grip on her shoulder. Stopping, he stood in front of his fellow Paladin and shook her shoulders gently.

“Pidge? Pidge, hey, stay awake. Can you hear me?”

Pidge nodded sleepily.

“How do you feel?”

“A little… tired,” Pidge slurred. “Cold,” she closed her eyes and shook her head.

Keith’s lips drew into a thin line. He’d been a blundering idiot. Pidge was small, her armor cracked, and Sogreron’s temperature was cold enough already. He should’ve foreseen the possibility of hypothermia after he’d pulled her from the water, but his own temperature had made him misjudge the severity of it all. 

Pulling his hat off his head, Keith dusted the snow off and stuffed it down over Pidge’s short, fluffy hair, making sure it was snug. His hands moved to his goggles and adjusted the straps to cover his ears, then told Pidge to sit down. She did so with little protest (unusual for Pidge, which concerned him more), and Keith set to work tying the blankets tighter around her small form. He then pulled a thermos of water from her bag and tucked it in a fold in her blankets. Another attempt to contact Red proved futile, and he pulled his cowl up over his nose against the biting cold.

“Are you comfortable?” he asked.

Pidge nodded slowly and blinked, “Why?” she whispered.

“Because,” Keith said, stooping to scoop her up in his arms, “I’m carrying you the rest of the way.”

A soft “Oh,” was all Pidge could manage.

Keith started off, the added weight slowing his pace, but it became easier as he gained momentum. When he’d picked up Pidge, he’d moved the thermos closer to himself, where it would warm against his body heat. At this point, he’d raised his temperature enough that he was too hot to touch. On anyone else it would be considered a fatal fever, but the power his Lion had imbued him with allowed him to not only withstand the heat, but to raise it higher. 

For now, though, he just needed to rewarm Pidge. It was his hope that he could heat the thermos enough for it to have warming effects from the inside—if she stayed awake long enough to drink it. When he stopped and urged her to try to drink some, she’d seemed half asleep, and that alarmed him further. To sleep would lower her body temperature even more; he couldn’t allow that to happen.

“Hey Pidge,” he said, once he’d continued walking.

Pidge hummed in question and gave him a questioning look.

“You have to stay awake, okay?”

A lazy smile played across her features, “Why?”

Keith frowned and looked down at her, “Because if you do, you’ll die.”

Pidge blinked at him.

“And if you die,” Keith continued, “I’ll have to kill you.”

“Well that’s not... very nice,” Pidge slurred.

“Well neither is you dying, so don’t.”

Pidge seemed to find this funny.

Keith did not.

He told her to drink more water.

After a while, Pidge started humming. Keith thought he could recognize it, but wasn’t sure. When asked, Pidge couldn’t remember what it was, and started mumbling something of another tune. This gave Keith an idea.

“Keep singing, Pidge.”

“What?”

“Keep singing.”

“Oh, okay,” Pidge’s voice rose a little.

 

_ Crown of leaves, high in the window on a cold morning _ __  
_ Young today, old as a railroad tomorrow _ __  
_ Days are just drops in the river to be lost always _ _  
_ __ Only you, only you, you know

 

The song carried through the silent forest, trailing off when she seemed to have forgotten the rest. Keith was surprised at how gentle the Green Paladin’s voice was, whether that owed to her current state of delirium or not. Face shifting into a thoughtful expression, Pidge began on another song, filling the hollow left in the wake of her voice.

 

_ Death is a wall but it can't be the end _ __  
_ You are my protector and my best friend _ __  
_ Well they say that you're gone and that I should move on _ __  
_ I wonder: how do they know, baby? _ _  
_ __ How do they know? Well, they don't

 

Pidge finished her song when they quitted the forest of drooping pines. The spire of rock was visible now, perhaps 30 yards away, and the sky beyond it was an overcast grey. Pidge hummed to herself while Keith crossed the distance, endeavoring to ignore the cold that bit into his face when his cowl had slipped down, his hands so occupied as to disable his amending it. 

Keith stood at the base of the spire, eyes directed towards its steep slopes as he planned his route to the top when Pidge stopped humming and turned her gaze upon him.

“Keith,” she whispered.

Keith glanced at her, “Yeah?” He’d seen an agreeable path, and was now moving towards it, placing his feet carefully among the icy rocks.

“It’s your turn to sing now.”

Keith frowned and hopped over a rock. “I don’t sing,” he said sternly.

Pidge shook her head slightly, “Don’t care. ‘Ts your turn,” she said groggily.

Keith huffed indignantly, “If I do, you have to promise to stay awake.”

Pidge blinked, then nodded slowly.

“I want a verbal answer, Pidge.”

“I promise,” her arms shifted in her blanket cocoon, likely crossed with whatever annoyance she could summon up despite her condition.

Keith sighed and pulled his foot from between two rocks, thinking. Then, softly, he sang;

 

_ She left a week to roam _ __  
_ Your protector's coming home _ __  
_ Keep your secrets with you, girl _ __  
_ Safe from the outside world _ __  
__  
_ You walk along the stream _ __  
_ Your head caught in a waking dream _ __  
_ Your protector's coming home _ _  
_ __ Coming home

 

He continued as he climbed the spire with steady feet, hoping desperately for the ability to contact Red once the top was reached. Pidge was light in his arms, and though the rocks were icy, he was sure-footed. When they arrived at the peak and he finished the song, Pidge urged him to continue as he set her down gently among the rocks. Keith refused, however, and searched the peak for any sign of the weapon while Pidge hummed to herself again.

The spire, he soon discovered, was hollowed and housed the weapon inside it, as the rocks he stood on concealed a metal hatch beneath the snow. Bayard drawn, he proceeded to pry open the doors that formed the hatch. Just underneath he found a dish on a pivot joint atop a needle that descended many feet into the rock structure. It was, without a doubt, the weapon whose destructive force was visible in the debris revolving around Sogreron’s sun. He would destroy it once they were safely inside his Lion.

Allowing the hatch doors to slide shut again, Keith stowed his bayard and opened up his the weather radar on his gauntlet. To his surprise, the storm, so offensive to his attempts to contact Red, was now gone. Thus encouraged, he opened the communications channel and immediately established a link with his Lion, informing her of the need of an urgent extraction from their location. Though distant, he could feel her concern in the back of his mind, in that place where their bond was so deeply nested. It was warm and reassuring, but his nerves would not be eased until he and Pidge were both safely on board.

Red appeared in the sky not long after, and made her approach rapidly. She roared with triumph at her speedy arrival, and ushered the Paladins quickly inside. Keith bent and collected Pidge in his arms once again, and stepped over the gap between the rock and Red’s jaw. He hurried up the ramp and, removing her backpack, laid Pidge on the bunk, securing her with the available straps before retrieving extra blankets from Red’s storage bins. These he used to cover her, and propped her head up with pillows.

Rushing up to the cockpit, Keith drew Red back from the spire and turned her lasers on the rocky tower, blasting it from Sogreron’s frigid surface forever. He then gave Red instructions to return to the Altean Castle-Ship, and returned himself to Pidge’s side.

Breathing a sigh of relief, he let himself relax.

Safe at last.

**Author's Note:**

> I had a cool idea and got carried away with the buildup, only to get stuck on song choice once I actually got to where the idea itself takes place in this story. Big thanks to the lovely ladies of wifetron for some song suggestions. In order of appearance we have “Drops in the River” by Fleet Foxes, “In the Wind” by Lord Huron, and “Your Protector” by Fleet Foxes. Also, if you’re curious about the sounds the ice made, go search ‘ice cracking sounds’ on youtube and listen to the top two results.


End file.
